


hydrangeas for forgiveness

by flashandsubstance



Series: pray you love, remember [1]
Category: Justice League & Justice League Unlimited (Cartoons), Justice League - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Depression, Episode: s02e11-12 A Better World, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Hurt No Comfort, M/M, Post-Episode: s02e11-12 A Better World, Suicidal Thoughts, WHOOPS ALL PAIN, Wally West is The Flash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-19
Updated: 2018-09-19
Packaged: 2019-07-14 05:25:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 861
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16033892
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flashandsubstance/pseuds/flashandsubstance
Summary: Love is worth the price, until it comes time to pay it. Bruce knows this intimately.





	hydrangeas for forgiveness

**Author's Note:**

> i am kept up at night by the possibilities of lord batman’s fate so this has been in the works for a while now :)
> 
> AND ITS MY FIRST FUCKIN POSTED BATFLASH FIC! REJOICE

Bruce Wayne is rebuilding Gotham.

Bruce Wayne is rebuilding Gotham, and rebuilding Central City, though much less openly. 

Every weekend, he visits a grave in Central City.

The grave reads  _ A true hero and a true friend. _ There is a monument, but he does not visit it. It is too public. Too exposed. 

Flowers are left every time, hydrangeas for forgiveness.

Bruce Wayne fell in love, and Bruce Wayne paid the price.

-

There’s a vigilante in Gotham. A dark shadow, never seen for more than a moment.

His methods are familiar.  _ It’s the Bat! _ Some whisper.

He doesn’t have the cape. He doesn’t have the ears.

He isn’t Batman.

He doesn’t deserve to be Batman.

Batman did not believe that Lex Luthor deserved to die. Batman believed that you shouldn’t take a life, Batman didn’t work with killers.

Batman didn’t kill, directly or indirectly.

There’s a vigilante in Gotham. He is not Batman.

-

Wally West’s funeral was a private affair. One person came. It was closed casket. (Too much of his head splattered against the pavement.)

The deceased had no family alive who loved him enough to come, at least, no family that had not disowned him. And no friends who hadn’t died because of the Lords and their regime.

So, Bruce Wayne paid for the burial, the casket, the gravestone. Bruce Wayne sorted out his will.

Bruce Wayne watched as the body of the man he had slowly come to love was lowered into the earth.

Love did not come easy to Bruce. Nor did tears, but both came for Wally West.

-

Gotham City is a cleaner, safer place.

It’s clean and safe and the citizens live in more fear than they did before the Justice Lords took over.

The slightest misdemeanor would get you dragged away while they were in power. 

He broke the city, beat it into a shape unfamiliar. Bound it with chains of fear and tyranny.

Gotham is not a clean, safe place. But this city is not Gotham anymore.

-

Sometimes he thinks about what the other Bruce said to him.

The good Bruce, the one who didn’t stand by and watch as those around him killed, as he let people, real people get slaughtered and lobotomized.

“They’d be so proud of you, don’t you think?”

No. They wouldn’t. They’d look at him with scorn in their eyes, hate on their tongues. And he’d deserve it. 

There’s a lot he deserves, none of it good.

He doesn’t deserve good.

-

He used to be happy. Well, maybe not happy.

He used to be content. Well, maybe not content.

He used to have things that made his life worthwhile.

The knowledge of a job well done, the knowledge that he saved lives.

A father figure, stoic and steadfast, level-headed whenever crisis struck. Who knew just how to pull him away when he dove in too deep, who reminded him to eat and to take a break. 

A friend, a real one. (Though there was hope for something more.) Monitor duties shared, quiet nights on the Watchtower when nothing occured and Wally put on Star Trek. The soft smiles and tender glances, kind, near-loving words shared when no one else was around to hear them. 

All gone.

He stopped saving lives, started ruling them.

Alfred died.

Wally is-

-

Gone.

Everything is gone.

He’d arrived a moment too late, and lost the one person who maybe, truly loved him back.

A moment more and he could have stopped Luthor, saved him. But no.

He didn’t save Wally.

He didn’t save Luthor either, and what does that say about him?

-

He wonders what he’ll do when his work is done. When there’s nothing left but pain and grief and the sting of a wound that will never close as long as he lives.

He thinks about Wayne Tower, one of the tallest buildings in Gotham.

He thinks about the sharp Batarangs left unused in what used to be the Batcave. He’s not been down there since they left him alone.

He thinks about how easy it would be to drift off and dream forever, an empty bottle of pills beside him.

He thinks about who would find the body. No one. There’s no one left who would bother to come looking.

And then he thinks about the other Wally’s last words to him. 

“Take care of yourself.”

His last request. The last thing that Bruce would likely ever hear him say.

So Bruce tries not to think about towers, batarangs, and pills, about the void where friends and family long gone should be.

It’s hard sometimes.

-

If he weren’t alive, who would be there to visit an unassuming grave in Central City to make sure it has fresh flowers? Who would remember the man behind The Flash?

Who would remember his cheesy grins and bad puns, how he always remembered everyone’s taste in coffee, how he gave everyone handmade valentines and heartfelt gifts, how he always loved to talk, and even more so, loved to listen. How he treated even his villains and enemies with kindness. How he had loved his friends.

How Bruce had loved him.

How he had died.

**Author's Note:**

> my tumblr is cryptid-batman come talk to me!!


End file.
